ELDERLY HEARING-IMPAIRED PERSONS COPING BEHAVIOR

Little is known about the coping behaviors associated with hearing imp airment. In this study, 24 elderly hearing-impaired participants parti cipated in a structured video interview including communication faults (provocations) presented in association with sounds. The participants also completed measures of self-perceived hearing handicap, optimism, and depression. Several behaviors were coded independently by two obs ervers using a rating scale that reached an average Cohen's kappa of . 75. A more conservative estimate resulted in a kappa of .50. Results s howed that the provocations affected behavior differently. Especially problematic for the participants was a provocation in which the interv iewer talked with his hand in front of his mouth. With one exception, no gender differences were found. Few significant relations between th e assessed behaviors and self-assessed handicap, optimism, and depress ion were found. Hearing measurements (pure tone average and speech rec ognition) were not clearly related with the coping behaviors assessed. Behavioral observation techniques designed for the elderly hearing im paired should be further studied.